Glory to the Desperate
by Lady NeverAfterNon
Summary: Capable takes it upon herself to go out and retrieve the fallen so that they can get a proper burial. She gets much, much, more than she bargained for in the form of subterranean mutants, cannibalistic mayhem, and madness. Capable/Nux, hints of Max/Furiosa.
1. Glory to the Desperate

**Author's Note** : Awesome movie, can't wait for the next one.

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 **Glory to the Desperate**

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" _Glory to the Desperate,_

 _And to those who've fallen down,_

 _For they will find their merit,_

 _Just when they're about to drown."_

The Wasteland is not for the weak, but strength doesn't have to be evil. Capable comes to this revelation in bits and pieces, in flashes of touch and gesture. The memory of Nux's clumsy kiss on her cheek, Splendid's ethereal ghost on the rig, and the whispered gift of Max's name to a dying woman.

Joe's strength is not the strength of the women who now rule his towering citadel. Furiosa governs with ruthless fairness, and it is this fairness that the masses below the citadel subject themselves to willingly. She does not suffer fools, but she does not dignify suffering with greatness. Thus Furiosa becomes the Dreadful Queen, and the Wives become her Shield Maidens, things no longer.

They keep the Norse theme Joe had going- some things are harder to change than others.

The women are not things, Capable knows, and the desperate are not useless. And since none of them are things, they are people, and people are important- all people, even the dead. They would not be here without the sacrifices of the dead.

Capable repeats this all to herself as two days after the Wives' victory, she steals a car. Well _, pursuit vehicle_ , as the two War Boys clamoring up into the back call it. They don't get off when she tells them that she's doing something stupid. Their response is loud in the silence, their answer in the slight creaking noise of bone white grips tightening on their bang spears.

She may be dragging them down with her in this seriously dumb plan of hers, but she's glad of their company. Capable is no Furiosa. She doesn't kid herself that her plan is probably going to fail, but things don't value the dead, and she's not going to leave Splendid and Nux and the Vuvalini to rot in unmarked sand.

Her plan is stupid, but it's the right thing to do. Even if it is a little mad.

The sun on the sand is blinding, even through the protection of her khol war paint, goggles, and heavy scarf. She's tried to mark herself up, make herself appear like just another wasteland wretch. Her red hair has been braided into dreds with greasy rags from the mech bay, and her face obscured with the War Boys' black paint in sharp slashes across her eyes and cheeks. She even blackened her teeth with ink. Anything to keep her from looking like a girl, like a Wasteland War Lord's prize broodmare. She sets out, feeling not at all ready, but unable to go back. Fortunately it's not hard to follow the Fury Road- it's well marked by carnage and destruction. Capable hopes that the road battle with Joe and his allies was enough to burn out any potential dangers that may lie in wait.

She's right, and she's wrong.

The fight between Furiosa and Joe upset the balance of the territories, but it practically built a flashing neon 'supplies for the taking' sign to scavengers. She should have expected the trail of bodies and destroyed vehicles to be a smorgasbord to the Wasteland's underbelly denizens.

Capable finds the crushed bodies of the Valkyrie and one of the Vuvalini lying half buried in the dirt. The push bar on one of the vehicles had sheared the skin off of the Valkyrie's head and caved in the back of her skull, but the body of the Vuvalini underneath her was relatively unharmed, save for the unmistakable fact that she was dead, and they are both covered in a shifting carpet of hungry black flies.

Capable makes the War Boys keep watch while she struggles with the bodies alone. It's a good thing too, because when she wraps the second body in burlap and begins to drag it back to the bed of the car, one of the guards lets out a loud whoop.

Looking up, she is just in time to see a small dune buggy crest the top of the hill and come barreling at them: one of the scavengers probably thought she'd found something of value that they missed. The concept of retrieving a body for burial would be alien to them.

Bullets pepper the sand in a line up to the side of their armored car, pinging uselessly off the side. One of her War Boys shouts with glee and lobs one of his bang spears. Say whatever you like about Immortan Joe: his people were all well trained, and the War Boy's aim is deadly. The dune buggy explodes, raining shrapnel and bits of flame across the sand.

It also sends up a tower of black smoke that an idiot couldn't fail to miss.

Capable glances back to the Citadel, now the barest smudge of a mirage on the brilliant horizon. There would be no help coming in time, if there was any help on the way at all. There probably wasn't, Capable figured. Furiosa didn't deal with idiots and the Citadel was hard won ground. She wouldn't risk losing it by leaving.

"We gotta go," she shouts, panting, stowing the second body and flinging herself into the driver's seat. The War Boys scrambled back over the shifting sand from where they'd been looting the smoking dune buggy. One wore a belt of explosives around his waist like wreath of deadly fruit and the other toted a sniper rifle with a barrel almost as he was- the strap of it a black slash across his scrawny chalk white chest.

When they are aboard, she floors the gas, spitting dirt and sand out behind her. Her car eats up the miles, retracing the Fury Road.

Unease begins to bloom in her when she realizes that while she sees many of Joe's destroyed vehicles, she doesn't see any bodies. Her knuckles tighten on the wheel. It's been two days, not long enough for the carrion birds to strip the bodies. There should be _something_ at least.

Capable parks at the top of a dune overlooking the rocky canyon where Nux met his end. She cranks open the sunroof and pops out in front of her War Boys, one of whom hands her his binoculars. The other sights through the sniper rifle's scope, the long barrel resting on the roof of the car.

"What do you guys think?" she asks. It looks perfectly safe to her, but then again, war is not her trade.

"S' quiet," the one with the scope says, oddly hoarse.

"Lik'a grave," the other agrees, unable to squelch a little manic giggle.

A shiver runs up her spine, but she quashes it mercilessly. This is not a place to be frozen by fear.

"What are your names?" she asks instead, handing back the binoculars. They're both much older than the War Boys she's used to seeing- probably why they hadn't been part of Joe's War Party.

The War Boy with teeth filed to points and ruined stub of flesh for a left ear takes the binoculars. He merely grins at her, displaying all of his sharp teeth.

The other, slightly shorter, with pink lines of scaring forming an elaborate road map on his back that Capable can't read and a rattle in his lungs jabs himself in the chest with his thumb. "M' Dodge. Me mate is Zip. He don't talk much, got is' throat cut a ways back."

"I see," Capable says, and now she notices the wicked thick line along Zip's throat, "Well, thank you for coming with me. I'm glad I'm not doing this alone."

"Course," Dodge says fiercely, his strange rattling voice catching, "You n' the shiny ones brought the water. The freedom. Keep you safe."

Zip nods, his strange sunken eyes watching her out of his skull like face. So like Nux, it's painful. Capable is suddenly unsure she's ready to see his body, though she knows she can't leave him alone in the desert, lost forever in a sea of endless shifting sand.

"Thanks."

She pops back down through the roof and back into the driver's seat quick so that they won't see her cry. She misses Nux something fierce.

The skeleton of the War Rig lies plugging the mouth of the canyon, an almost unrecognizable wreckage of black metal. She parks the car a little ways from it, leaving the engine running. Capable shoves open the door to the car and her boots hit the sand.

"One of you stays with the car," she shouts over her shoulder, and runs to the remnants of the War Rig's cab.

Zip springs off the back of the car and follows her while Dodge slides into the driver's seat, revving the engine.

Capable scrambles and claws her way up the cab. The front of the truck is scorched and blackened. The fire burned hot and fast, but the sand put it out before it had a chance to really go anywhere. She half slithers into the cab through the broken window, searching frantically. Nux's body is gone. The inside of the truck is burned, but not enough to incinerate a corpse completely, and the War Rig's roll cage protected the interior enough to keep a body intact. Mostly.

None of this explains why Nux's body is fucking _gone_. What monster would steal a body but leave the ride? There were no bodies of the War Boys on the road here. The men belonging to the Bullet Farmer and the People Eater were gone too. Where the hell were the bodies? Rage boiled up inside her. Whoever or whatever took Nux's body was going to pay. She owed him that much.

Zip searches her face. "Valhalla?" He suggests.

Capable shakes her head fiercely. That was just a load of crap Joe told to keep his boys in line. There was something else. That they would be spirited away to a mythical hall in the sky, when Joe treated them like shit on the ground, was just plain silly. Someone had to have had a reason to steal a bunch of corpses. She was certain it wasn't going to be a reason she would like.

Capable was just about to suggest that they go back to the car to look for tracks or something when an explosion nearly threw her from the rig. Zip took the brunt of it, Capable could feel him flinch at the wave of hot air that pelted them with shards of flaming debris. Zip didn't give her a chance to move, he drug her down with him under the belly of the truck, in a small gap between the tank and the cab. From there they could see the flaming wreckage of her car.

More importantly she could see the things dragging Dodge's limp body to their truck.

They weren't like any Wastelanders Capable had ever seen before. Their car was a mishmash of parts, like most, but it was decorated with decaying human corpses stuck onto poles. The creatures themselves were pale and misshapen, and it took Capable a second to realize that they wore clothing made from human skin.

She thought she was going to be sick. The idea that one of those things could be wearing Nux or Splendid-

A few of them broke off and headed back to the ruined rig. As they got closer Capable could see the details in their skin garments- hollowed out faces and leathery shells of limbs. She could also see the almost translucent skin of the mutants who wore them. They'd mutilated their bodies almost beyond the point that they were human. Noses gone, stitched into flat slits, lips carefully sheered off, exposing red gums. No ears, no hair, just vast expanses of rubbery grayish pink skin and dark soulless eyes. She thought she was going to puke.

Zip wriggled around so that he was in front of her, and Capable saw him draw a long serrated knife from his boot. She drew the pistol she'd taken from the armory. They weren't going to take her without a fight. She was _not_ going to become a people suit, not if she could help it. What would Furiosa do? She'd probably have a plan. Capable tried to think. All she could hear was the steady sound of feet towards their hiding spot, and the thudding of her own heart beat.

A sharp crack of a rifle broke through the tension, the sound echoing off of the rocks. One of the mutants dropped, head exploding in gobbets of meat. The other wielded around, searching the rocks for the shooter. Whoever had the rifle dropped him too, a hole opening up in the mutant's chest cavity in a spray of blood.

Capable lay frozen, Zip's hand like an iron band on her ankle, keeping her in place. The shooter might not know there was anyone hiding. The mutants that had taken Dodge were out of sight now, and Capable was itching to be after them. Without a doubt they had taken Nux's body, and most likely Splendid's too. The moment it was safe she would-

Boots crunched in the gravel, pausing in front of their hiding place.

The shooter bent, setting down his rifle, and Max's face peered in at them.

"Long way from home," he observed.

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 _To be continued..._


	2. Back on the Fury Road

**Author's Note:** Thanks for the feedback guys! I means a lot!

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 **Glory to the Desperate**

 _Chapter 2: Back on the Fury Road_

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"Where you going?"

Max's low monosyllabic voice stops Capable in her tracks. She'd been about to go see if the mutant's abandoned car would start, but now she turns to face him. Zip figured out what she'd been about to do though, and he continues on to the car, leaving them to sort out their problems.

"We're going after them," Capable said slowly. Maybe he didn't understand. "They took Dodge, and may have taken Nux and Splendid."

Max is silent for a while, rolling a plastic spent shotgun shell between his teeth like a candy apple red cigar. "Cushy life back at the fort. You do this, chances are you die hurtin.' Won't be like if Joe caught you. Won't go back to that nice fancy room of yours," he says calmly.

Capable takes a deep shuddering breath. She knew what she was probably signing up for the moment she took the car out of the War Boys' engine bay. "I know," Capable said, trying to keep the warble out of her voice and mostly succeeding. "But it's the right thing to do. Besides, whoever these freaks are, they're on our doorstep- Furiosa's doorstep. She's going to need to know if they're a threat."

Max is silent again, and Capable hopes she's played her cards right. She is terrified, that wasn't a lie, and neither was the possible threat to the Citadel. It was pretty much a given that mutants with a penchant for turning people into togas might crop up to be an issue. The gamble was playing off of Max's potential soft spot for Furiosa. Capable wasn't sure if she'd read the signs right. Max may have helped the Wives because it was something to do but Capable suspected it was something else. She thought she'd seen something in the weight of his gaze when he watched Furiosa, the odd gentleness in his hands, and the pleading anchor of his name when he asked her not to die. She feels shitty trying to manipulate him but it's a good bet she and Zip can't rescue Dodge and their fallen warriors on their own.

Max spits the shell out and finally looks at her. "You sure?" he asks. "No turnin' back."

Capable puts her hands behind her so he won't see her wipe her sweaty palms on her sleeves. She's terrified, but she can't turn back. She won't. She is a person, not a thing. People make decisions, even when they're afraid, they get to choose. And Capable chooses the memory of Nux and Splendid. She'd rather die making a decision of her own choosing, then live like a slave with no purpose but to serve.

"I'm scared," she admitted, "But I can't leave them there. I can't leave them behind."

Up in front of them, Zip has got the mutants' creepy little rig started and idling while he waits for them to finish up.

Blowing air out from between pursed lips, Max shrugs. "Alright then," he says, and heads for Zip and their new ride.

Capable glances back at her destroyed car. The fire has burnt itself out and she can just see the silhouette of the two bodies still wrapped in the back of the car. Thank god she'd had the foresight to steal the fire-retardant cloth. The bodies should keep until they could be buried properly.

"Hey," Capable says when she reaches Zip's window, "Let me drive. You're a much better shot than I am. I'd be no good up top."

His response is to show her all his teeth in a mad grin, and he eels out the window like a pale scarred octopus to ride on the roof with Max. The truck is a standard transmission and Capable has to mutter the sequence to herself as she starts off, following the mutants' tracks.

 _Clutch on the left. Neutral to first. Release clutch slow and press gas. I've got this. I can do it. Clutch. Second. Clutch. Third. What would Furiosa do? Nux? FLOOR IT._

Her boot slams the gas to the ground and sends the truck bouncing away after her quarry.

The trail follows the ridgeline, quickly leaving anything Capable is able to recognize. It is a bouncing and rocky ride and takes every bit of her meager skill just to keep control of the vehicle. Still, she can see why Nux loved this so much. Her adrenaline spikes with each careening turn she makes, and Capable almost feels like the truck is an extension of her. It is glorious.

Capable is nearly too busy enjoying the ride to notice that the tracks have veered off into almost nothingness. Max bangs on the roof and she hurriedly stomps on the brake, forgetting the clutch completely, and the truck jerks to a halt and dies in the same moment.

"Sorry," she says sheepishly when Max's head pops into view. "Have I ruined it?"

A slight smile tugs briefly at his mouth. "Nah. It'll take more'n that to break this monster."

Relief washes over her, glad that her dumb mistake hasn't doomed them to a whole lot of walking. Capable climbs out taking in their surroundings. She can't see anything of significance in the craggy looming rock spires which cast eerie shadows over them as the sun slowly sinks toward the horizon.

"Set a trap, boss," suggests Zip, low, as he too studies the rocks. A battle plan, not a request. Something he'd never have dared to do under Immortan Joe. Joe didn't much care for his boys thinking. They might get ideas of mutiny.

Max nods. "Gotta find a hole big enough to bring a truck through first. They hid it somehow."

The two men move off, scanning and hunting for any signs of movement. They're a stark contrast to each other. Zip is as white as a ghost, thin and spidery, while Max is tall and solid and formidable, but they move like a cohesive team. Capable follows them, bringing up the rear and wondering what she should do to help, but feeling like asking would just get in the way. There's no time, not if she wants to keep the fallen whole. The thought of what the mutants could be doing to Nux or Splendid makes her sick.

Capable stops, watching the two men move off. They're scaling the rocks now looking for a perch that will give them a good view and the upper hand of their surroundings. Deciding to wait to see what orders they will give her, and they will when they've got a plan, she kneels in the dirt.

It's more like dust really, a deep red color that brings to mind old wounds not yet healed. Would Splendid and Nux have healed if Furiosa and Max had decided to go back for them?

Capable rubs her hands in the dirt and then smears her fingers across her face.

To her left there is a soft scrabbling of stones and she freezes. Max and Zip went up. The noise is down with her, nearby. Slowly she turns her head and finds two of the mutants half out of the rocks watching her. They don't move, and Capable is reminded of the frozen stillness of dogs right before they lunge for prey. Up close, they're terrifying. Capable is no stranger to the horrible ravages the Wasteland can inflict on the human body. Hell, Joe was all but covered in weeping sores, tumors, and necrotizing tissue, but these mutants look entirely alien. She can see their near translucent skin and the tracery of dark veins underneath, and long, long strangling fingers that are eerily clean. Their eyes are what holds her captive though: dark holes that show her an abyss that she will never escape from.

Her skin crawls. She's caught, she knows she's caught. She has the unnerving urge to bolt, even though it'll do no good. Then she reconsiders. Max and Zip are hidden, and she's a girl who can barely drive and she can't really shoot. She's of no real use to the team, and the boys needed to know how to find the entrance. From the way they're watching her the mutants believe that she is alone. Whatever she does she can't let them find Max and Zip, or the truck.

She makes her decision. Capable schools her face into a look of abject terror, which isn't hard, and then she bolts. Racing away across the rocks, away from the boys and away from the truck, making as much noise as possible.

 _Follow me, come on. Follow me. Don't see them, follow me!_

When she hears the rapid pitter patter of their footsteps coming after her, she shrieks. Capable makes it about fifteen feet before she's tackled and she comes down hard. Blood fills her mouth, coppery and sweet. In her terror she forgets to feel for a wound- all she knows is that it isn't her tongue she just bit down on.

Oh good hell they reek, and Capable is reminded of the pile of bodies that serves as the Wretched graveyard stinking in the hot desert sun. They wrench her up and she couldn't escape even if she wanted to. She risks a glance up at the rocks and is just in time to see Zip make a move for her, and Max shove him back down.

Knowing that her plan is working so far makes it a bit more bearable as her captors drag her down into the dark.

Hands slide into her clothes ruthlessly as she's dragged along, searching for weapons, and pulling away her gun. She feels its loss keenly and it is made worse because she cannot see anything in the blackness.

Suddenly the rocky ground beneath her feet drops away and her captors give her a bruising shove. She is airborne, flying out into nothingness. Before she can make any sort of noise, she hits the ground. Her left wrist takes the brunt of her fall and Capable feels a sharp snap quickly followed by agonizing pain.

It hurts, and she wonders if she's broken it, but all she can think is _thank god it is not my gun hand_.

Something grasps her shoulder in the dark, and she kicks out with one of her heavy booted feet, and is rewarded by a grunt of pain.

"Girl- hey, stop!"

-And Capable registers with some surprise that it is the voice of one of the Vuvalini, the younger one that she vaguely recalls tumbling from the rig at one point. There is a spark, and then a small flame flickers in the dark, illuminating dozens of faces, including the Vuvalini woman who holds the tiny light. Dozens of people, from dozens of tribes. Some are from the Rock Rider Motorcycle Gang, others from Gas Town and the Bullet Farm. There are others that Capable doesn't even recognize and it is terrifying at how many there are. Another thought hits her: the Wastelanders watching her are all members of their tribes' warrior class. What the hell is going on?

"C'mon," the Vuvalini says, and gestures Capable to follow her deeper into the pit.

"What is this place?" Capable whispers. Her voice echoes oddly in the deep cavern.

"Cattle Pen." The Vuvalini's answer chills her, though she half expected it anyway.

The Vuvalini's tiny light is soon over shadowed by another, much larger, light ahead in the dark. There is a small group of people huddled around it, and as Capable takes in the surroundings that she can now roughly make out, she sees dozens of other fires with many people grouped around them. Cattle. This is a herd that the subterranean mutants must treat like a farm. The Vuvalini leads her to one of the fires, and as they come closer she recognizes Dodge. He's bent over a pallet, holding a water skin out to the body lying on it.

Her heart begins to thud in her chest, and as they come closer she breaks into a run.

"Nux!" She's sobbing, laughing, she doesn't know what the hell she's doing. All she knows is that she cannot stop.

Dodge gets out of the way as she drops to her knees by Nux's side. She's not quite sure if she should touch him. The War Boy is badly burned, his arms and chest are charred black with weeping blisters.

"Been trying to keep him from festering, he goes in and out of consciousness," the Vuvalini says quietly from just behind her. "He's got a broken arm, which we can't set until the rest of him gets dealt with. And my herb stores are almost gone."

"I sit on is' legs when he gets the fits," Dodge offers cheerfully. "And hold is' head still!"

Capable can only nod. Her hand reaches out, then falls. She'll only make it worse if she touches him- might give him germs, make the sick worse.

"What's happening on the outside?" The Vuvalini asks.

"Furiosa took the Citadel," Capable answers as calmly as she can. Her hand drifts towards Nux again but she drags it back. "I came out with Max and two War Boys to bring back the people we lost. For a proper burial, so they won't be forgotten."

The Vuvalini hears what she does not say, and the woman's grin is feral. Max and the other War Boy are still out there, still free, and they'll be coming for them.

The Vuvalini gestures at the rest of the group. "Guessing you know Dodge, then. This here's Pretty Boy and the Doom Goddess. The little one is Pig."

Capable's eyes drift over the rest of their little group. Pretty Boy looks to be about thirty, and his tanned face is surprisingly unscarred for someone his age. Combined with his lack of tumors, close cropped thick brown hair and big brown eyes; she can see how he got his name. The Doom Goddess isn't much younger than Pretty Boy. Her skin is the pale color of exposed bone bleached by the desert sun, and marred by scars and tiny black script tattooed into her skin. The words drip from her mouth to run down her chin, whorl over her chest in arms in geometric lines. Words circle her eyes and run in slashes down her cheeks. The woman's dark hair is bound up in heavy dreds that clack softly when the bone and metal ornaments tied into her dreds shift. Pig is a tiny little girl of about five or seven with unruly matted blond hair, only a few teeth, and a nose that has been broken so often that it has healed into a tiny accordion shape on her face. The child doesn't stand- she scuttles along the ground like a crab, watching them all with mistrust.

"My name is Intrepid," the Vuvalini adds, holding out a hand. "Thank you for coming back for us."

Capable shakes it. 'Of course," she said fiercely.

"Rest," the Doom Goddess says, and her voice reminds Capable of dead leaves singing in hot wind. There's a melody to it that makes her shudder. "They culled their meal for the night, and they not comin' back til tomorrow."

Ugh. So gross. Capable cringes at the thought of what their captors are doing right now. Do they even bother to cook their prey? Or do they just tear into them like animals?

"Shiny."

She almost doesn't recognize Nux's voice, it's more of a croak then a word. But when she turns, she finds him looking up at her with his blue eyes, and she is struck again by how pretty they are, incongruent with his warlike profession. She huddles up closer to him, still afraid to touch him, but wanting to be closer.

"Chrome," he adds reverently, and his ruined fingers curl in her red hair.

Despite the terrifying shithole they have found themselves in, delicious heat blossoms in her chest. Shiny and chrome, the highest praise a War Boy can think of, the prettiest thing he can imagine, and he uses those words to describe _her_. Capable has never felt so wonderful, so special. No one has ever looked at her the way Nux has. His hand stops, tugs slightly, and then comes away holding something that shines in the firelight. She looks at what he holds in his hand and realizes that he's found one of the blades she'd hidden in her hair before she left the Citadel.

He smiles at her, and Capable notices that one of his eyeteeth has been knocked out. She doesn't care. She is so very, very glad that he is alive. Nux waggles the blade at her. "Capable." He says her name like a designation of approval and an endearment. Capable thinks that in this moment she loves this boy like she's loved no one else. She wonders how to tell him, or if she even should.

Very carefully, he reaches out again, and his fingers find her cheek. She lets him guide her down to rest her head against an unruined patch of skin between his neck and shoulder. Capable makes sure that none of her mass of red hair is against his burns before she lets herself go slack.

"Missed you," she says against the side of his neck, already feeling drowsiness tug at her senses.

Nux tilts his head to rest against the top of hers. "Found you," he replies gently into her hair, and the words drip down into her skull to take root in her heart.

Capable lets herself fall into sleep, lulled by the voices of her companions and the feel of Nux's steady breathing in her hair.

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 _To be continued..._


	3. People of the Flesh

**Author's Note:** Probably a few more chapters, this is turning out to be a tad longer than I expected. Anyway, thanks for the feedback! I really appreciate it.

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 **Glory to the Desperate**

 _Chapter 3: People of the Flesh_

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Capable is wakened to the sounds of screaming, followed by a gunshot, and then ominous silence. Her eyes pop open and the languid lethargy that accompanied her sleep vanishes with the sharp blade of adrenaline that shoots up her spine. From the iron grip of fingers in her hair, she knows that Nux is awake. She lets out her breath carefully and gently pulls away from him. He lets her go, but his hand drops down to grasp hers. Capable keeps hold of his hand and steels her nerves.

It takes her eyes a moment to adjust to the sudden light. A contingent of warriors rides into the cavern on a flatbed truck outfitted with glaring white probe lights. They jab at anyone who tries to escape by clambering up onto the bed with large hooked spears. The ones who met the spears were lanced, beheaded, and rolled onto a pile on the truck.

Dodge twitches like he's going to make a mad charge at the truck, attack it all by himself. The Doom Goddess snags his arm and holds him fast.

"Only the new long pigs that run," she said, voice still that odd sing song cadence. "They want you to run. Then they eat you. You want to defy them? Make it hard, little ghostly man. Make them work for the eating."

Dodge just giggles, but he stays where he is. The Vuvalini Intrepid just watches in silence, her arms crossed over her chest. Pretty Boy is the only one who hasn't twitched so much as a muscle. He stays crouched by the fire, turning the carcass of some small animal on a spit.

As if the driver had heard them talking, the truck lurches towards them, bright lights washing over them in a sweep of blinding phosphorescence. Capable tenses, pressing closer to Nux, trying to shield him with her own body as best she can. He took care of her on the Fury Road, and now it's her turn to return the favor. She risks a glance down at him and sees that he has the blade he took from her in his hand. Her mouth goes dry and she grits her teeth. She will not let them take him from her. No one will ever take anything from her again, not now that she has the freedom of owning herself.

A woman rises from where she'd been sitting, hidden by the pile of corpses. She hops down from the truck, moving towards them, her gait an odd little scampering dance over the uneven ground. When she gets closer, confusion races through Capable, along with a tingling of adrenaline.

Up close, the tattoos that wind about the new comer's body are nearly identical to the Doom Goddess's. Black lines of text coil up over the woman's pallid flesh, winding across her skin like words of rope, interrupted only by her shift made of the dead she'd consumed. She wears a crown of bone, her dreadlocks coiled through the jagged white spires to hold it in place. The two women look chillingly similar, and it occurs to Capable suddenly that whatever this creepy tribe is, the Doom Goddess must have been a part of it once. Capable can understand now why Pig is so mistrustful.

She glances back at the Doom Goddess who's quite plainly wearing actual clothing, not people. Her snug black trousers are made from heavy duty canvas and the scrap of dark cloth binding her chest is crafted from woven cord and strips of tire.

"Still in the pen with the food?" the woman wearing the crown asks the Doom Goddess. No one answers her, and she shifts closer, circling them like a bipedal shark.

"Why do you cavort with the food?" she croons, tugging absently at her clothing. "Our people need our Shaman, work the healing magics. Not playin' in the barnyard like a little shlenga."

"Let us go," the Doom Goddess wheedles, still as a statue, her hands open and placating. "They are not…things. We are not things."

It surprises Capable to hear the Splendid Angharad's mantra from someone like the Doom Goddess. She glances at Intrepid who flashes her a small smile and a slight shrug, both gone before anyone can notice and guess their meaning. It occurs to her suddenly that the Vuvalini had been telling stories. In answer, the Bone Queen holds out one of the swords she has at her waist. It is a long, curved thing with a serrated edge near the hilt. Feathers and bone dangle from the crude leather sheath.

"Take up your sword, Shaman for the People of the Flesh. Take up your sword, be strikin' down that piglet that has led you to sin, eat his heart so that the evil will go away, and all will be forgiven."

The Doom Goddess does not move. Her expression is carefully blank. Slowly Pretty Boy stands. He does not move away from the fire, but the solidarity between him and the Doom Goddess is obvious. He looms behind her, a silent supporting wall ready to move at her command. The Vuvalini and Dodge casually maneuver to stand on either side of the Doom Goddess, showing their solidarity. Capable decides to throw her lot in with whatever little rebellion is taking place here and stands as well.

"We are the People of the Flesh," the woman wearing the crown suddenly snaps, enraged in the face of defiance. All semblance of easy conversation has been wiped from her and now only cold fury remains. "I am the Bone Queen, ruler of all! We eat the life and the power from the Lesser. You do not challenge me, Shaman. I will tear out your heart and feast on your strength."

The Doom Goddess does not answer but Capable can see the loosening in her limbs, getting ready to move. The Bone Queen has a feral look on her face, watching them with glittering black eyes and bared sharp teeth. Suddenly she lunges for the fire and Pretty Boy, who stays still, but Capable sees that his knuckles have gone white on the stick he's clutching. The Doom Goddess gets between them, checking the Bone Queen's lunge with her forearm, and smashes her forehead into her queen's in a surprising show of base brutality.

The Bone Queen reels backward, red blood leaking from her nose to connect with the red smear across her mouth.

"You bleed the same color," the Vuvalini observes dryly. "Why lookit' that, you holdn' the same shade of red as your food. Who's the Lesser now?"

The Bone Queen flashes her a terrible glance, then leaps back onto the truck bed. "Make ready!" she bellows. "Our Holy Shaman is no more. Tomorrow, we eat her strength and consume her wisdom. The People of the Flesh will rise up stronger than ever."

Spitting gravel from its over large tires in a wide arc, the truck beats a hasty retreat. A gate at the far end of the cavern rises to allow the truck through, and then they are alone once more. The Doom Goddess turns to them and flashes a weary smile. Stepping close to her, Pretty Boy carefully cups the back of her neck and lightly presses his forehead to hers. Capable coudl hear them murmuring quietly, but she could not make out what they said.

Nux's hand sliding loose from hers distracted her then, and she peered at him worriedly. His eyes were closed and he appeared to be sleeping. Capable bent close to him, her ear over his mouth and nose, and panic flooded her when she could neither hear nor feel his breath on her skin.

"No!" she shrieked. "No! You will not do this to me! Not now, not that I've found you."

The Doom Goddess drops to her knees next to her in a flurry of clacking beads and swinging dreads. She pressed her face close to the fallen War Boy's, clucking and chanting low under her breath. Her head slid down, barely touching his chest as she held her dirty dreds away from his skin, listening intently for the sound of his heart.

"His heart is finding its silent rest," the Doom Goddess said suddenly, straightening. She looked at Capable. "You must do what I tell you, when I tell you. Are you capable?"

"-Of whatever it takes," Capable finished grimly, throwing off her long coat and binding up her many braids with a strip of cloth. "Tell me what to do."

The Doom Goddess checked Nux's nose and mouth, looking to see if his airway was obstructed. "He was brought to the pen burned like little man-steak. He is possessed of much luck, this one. Hd your Vuvalini to carry him to me, and me being here to receive him with much of my medicines," she continued, passing her hands quickly several times through the open fire while her voice rose and fell in an interjected melodic chant. "Pinch his nose and open his mouth. When I tell you, give him air."

Capable nodded, feeling like someone had yanked the ground from beneath her feet. Nux was so still. It scared her to remember his unflagging strength looming around her on the Fury Road and to see him now lying prone and helpless. Dodge crept up to squat next to Nux's head, close enough to get in the way but near enough to offer his support. The Vuvalini and Pretty Boy were digging through a satchel made from scraps of tire, debating about what might be needed for the procedure.

The Doom Goddess began chest compressions, talking calmly while she did so. "It is by the will of the gods only that he yet lives. I need to be makin' knowing of the serious of his cooked skin. I cannot make knowing without scraping off the dead flesh, and I cannot scrape off death without the proper ritual. He is needing life water, and the life water is in my holy place. The life water I make him goes through his mouth and he is needing the life through his skin. Breath."

Capable stared at her, perplexed and bemused, and then hurriedly bends over Nux. His heavily scarred mouth was surprisingly soft. She tried not to focus on how he tasted, the glorious wet of it, as she forced air into him.

"Proper Ritual? Life water?" Capable asks in confusion as she straightens. She didn't see how any shaman bullshit would keep Nux alive, no matter how confident the Doom Goddess was. Science and actual medicine would help him not magic. She wishes fervently that the Organic Mechanic had not died on the Fury Road and that he were here now.

"IV with electrolytes," Pretty Boy supplies, squatting next to them. He held the water skin ready. "Or at least that's my best guess. DG makes a sort of smoothie from our rations: mostly cactus juice, dried banana, olives. Lots and lots of poppy. He's high as a kite on opium, which is why he's not out of his mind with pain. It helps keep him alive but he needs a lot of fluid. The holy ritual is mostly sanitation, I think. The dead skin acts as a shield for the stuff underneath. Once we take that off he has a good chance of getting sick."

"Breath," the Doom Goddess interrupted.

Capable fitted her mouth over Nux's and did as she was told. "What's your story?" she asks him, sitting back as the Doom Goddess continued the compressions.

Pretty Boy grins at her, showing a mouthful of surprisingly straight white teeth. "You mean, why am I in an underground cave system while a gorgeous, scary girl tries to keep her friends from eating me?"

Capable nods sheepishly and the Vuvalini snorts in derision.

"The Wasteland is a big place," Pretty Boy says thoughtfully. "My village was small and I was always curious about what lay beyond it. Books, learning and knowledge, were important to us. One day raiders burnt our village down, murdering anyone that got in their way. I was the only one left. I had nothing, so I wandered. I decided to map the Wasteland, keeping track of patches and the people in them. It was something to do, gave me a purpose anyway. I wanted to help the people who just wanted to survive to avoid the Wasteland's dangerous places. I met DG and her raiding party while I was mapping the mountains. She took me captive."

"How did you keep from getting eaten?" Capable asks bluntly. It is no secret now the monster the Doom Goddess used to be, and the terrible practices of her people.

Pretty Boy smiled and tugged gently on one of the Doom Goddess's bouncing dreds. "Told her tales of my adventures, what I was trying to do because of what had happened to my village."

"Breath," the Doom Goddess repeated sharply. "He had the fantastic making of stories and secret knowledge. I craved the knowing of his life but I did not want to destroy it with my own. I gave him escape- freedom. I did not want his flesh, and nor did I want my people to have the eating of it."

"So why are you still here?" Capable demands, confused at Pretty Boy's presence if he'd had a chance to get away.

"He would not leave without me." The Doom Goddess stares at Pretty Boy as though he were some mysterious text whose meaning was beyond her, some beautiful and terrible secret just out of her grasp.

"Because, my beautiful scary girl, I'd rather have a short life with you than an eternity wandering the Wasteland alone," Pretty Boy says simply. He bumped a kiss against the Doom Goddess's white, scarred, tattooed cheek. "Because I love you."

The Doom Goddess had an expression on her face then that suggested that someone had socked her in the stomach. Before she could reply, though, Nux gasped and spat black goo up onto his chin.

"Nux!"

Capable bent over him, searching his face for a sign that he was out of the woods. Tired blue eyes rolled over to meet her own, and her sigh of relief was more of a sob.

"The fire flower is keeping the torment away," the Doom Goddess observes casually. "But it slows down his heart, keeps him from spitting up the black."

"Opium helps with the pain," Pretty Boy translated, "but it keeps his breathing shallow and light so he can't cough out the smoke he inhaled. We must have accidentally given him too much- it stopped his heart."

Capable nods- it is all the response she is capable of, tears running down her face. Nux's eyes stayed on hers, fervent and bright, as though she were the only thing that mattered, a beacon shining in the dark. She loves him so much, is drowning with it, and he is the anchor that keeps her steady and keeps her from sinking.

"If he's going to survive," Intrepid says suddenly, "We need to get to the Doom Goddess's healing place. We can't wait for Max, because I don't know if Nux will make it through something like this again."

"He needs an IV and antibiotics," Pretty Boy agrees softly, handing Capable the water skin. "The stuff we have here is just not cutting it. Get him to take as much of this as you can. DG will mix up another batch."

Capable nods, helping Nux work his head up onto her thigh. She smooths her hand over the dirt and paint coating his bare skull while she holds the water skin to his lips. Her hand trembles only a little. He swallows, throat working to get down the thick sludge the Doom Goddess had created.

"Please finish it," she begs quietly, stroking her thumb along the delicate shell of his ear.

Nux obeys her, his eyes never leaving hers in a heartbreaking show of unwavering faith and trust. She wants to be worthy of that devotion, but she's only a girl. Just a girl with no skills that could help them survive. She can't really shoot and she can't really drive. A girl with only the words of learned men long dead rattling around in her brain, whose only purpose was to Breed. Perhaps it is her manifest destiny to fail. Capable hands the empty water skin off to the Doom Goddess, who moves a short ways away with the rest of the group to give them privacy.

Capable bends over him, and begins speaking very quickly and quietly. "You're going to live," she tells him fiercely. "It's my turn to keep you safe. I'm going to get us out of here, whatever it takes." It is the only way she can think of to tell him that she loves him, without actually saying the words. _I love you, I choose you, you are the destiny that I want. I love you, War Boy. Come what may, I love you_.

Nux reaches up a hand, running a finger along the seam of her lips. "Already livin'" he tells her, his voice a shade between a croak and a whisper, "I've found Valhalla and it's you." A declaration of love, just as close as hers, without saying the words.

It is the most terrifying and wonderful thing that has ever happened to her, Capable realizes. Greater even than her freedom bought though such a great price on the Fury Road. She has Chosen and been Chosen in return.

* * *

 _To be continued..._


	4. The Death of Pride and Savagery

**Author's Note** : Trying to write present tense/stream of consciousness/whateveryoucallit was just exhausting, and I kept slipping up. So, I'm switching up the writing tone. Sorry if it's weird for anyone.

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 **Glory to the Desperate**

 **Chapter 4:** _The Death of Pride and Savagery_

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Nux, during a bout of lucidity, made Capable practice with the knife he'd taken from her. Over and over she pulled it from her wrappings until she could slide it out and jab it into an invisible attacker with one lightning smooth motion. That earned her another feather light kiss on her cheek, and on impulse she kissed him full on his wide scarred mouth. Nux gave as good as he got, and it was wet and warm and lovely, despite how inexperienced they both were. Capable found that she couldn't stop grinning; both his approval at her efforts and his touch made her feel like she could take on anything. It was all purely fantasy or course, said a quiet practical voice at the back of her head that sounded a lot like Furiosa, soft and stupid will make you weak. The Wasteland has no place for fools or weaklings.

 _Shut up,_ Capable told the voice. _I still caught you checking out Max's ass during one of the raids_.

There was no reply from her brain and she wondered if that was a sign of madness, talking to one's self? Max did it, and Nux did it a _lot_. What was mad anyway? Capable dimly remembered a line from a book she'd read what seemed like centuries ago in the Wives' Vault, but was really only a matter of weeks. Madness. 'The best people usually are.' And that was certainly true. Immortan Joe, The Bullet Farmer, and the People Eater had all been chillingly sane and look where that had gotten them: absorbing and personifying every vice the Wasteland had to offer. The Wasteland was no Wonderland but there were no rules in either case. The rules were what you made them, and Capable was determined to set her own.

A shiver ran up Capable's spine when she realized what a slight turn of fate could have offered her. Rape, imprisonment- the life of a thing. She crouched down next to Nux's pallet, pressing her face against his temple, and holding tight to his hand. He was real and she was no longer a Thing.

"You gettin' pretty good with that pig sticker."

The Doom Goddess's voice had Capable straightening immediately, and the Shaman grinned a toothy smile when she noticed the matching looks of irritated frustration on the War Boy and his very capable nurse.

"Just wantin' to check your cooked meat," she said, raising her hands as she crouched next to them. "then I be leaving you two alone yeah? Must be ready to run soon. Run away and not look back. Vuvalini sayin' we not waitin' for ya crazy man to spring his trap. He might be springin' along the way most like."

Capable cocked her head, trying to piece together meaning from the Doom Goddess's weird melodic speech. "Intrepid says that Max is waiting for us to try to escape before he does anything?" she asked tentatively.

The Doom Goddess nodded approvingly, her dreds clacking. "Vuvalini sayin' ya boy good at makin' the bang n' scream, while everyone else be losin' they minds."

What the hell was a bang and scream? Try as she might, Capable had absolutely no idea how to disassemble that sentence.

Pretty Boy wandered up and affectionately tugged one of the Doom Goddess's dreds. She snapped at him with her sharp teeth and he swatted her playfully. "Intrepid thinks that your Max and Zip will probably be waiting for us to try escape, and then use the resulting focus on us to create confusion," he explained.

The Doom Goddess rolled her eyes in a 'that's what I said' manner, but she nodded in agreement.

Well, Capable certainly had no problem believing that plan of action anyway. The demise of the Bullet Farmer alone proved that Max was deadly when he was up against the wall, cornered with nowhere to go but resort to vicious retaliation. Zip would double his odds of success. _C'mon crazy War Boy_ , she thought. _Looka crazy War Boy_. The familiar chant filled her brain.

"What's the plan then?" Capable asked quietly, looking down at Nux. The War Boy had dropped into a fitful sleep that was regularly punctuated by harsh coughing. She had to remind herself that the coughing was the good thing, that every time the black gunk speckled his mouth Nux was a step close to getting better. "We have what, six hours before dawn?"

The Doom Goddess grinned, more of a feral baring of the teeth than a smile, and gestured behind her. "We not the only people that have the wanting of freedom. They makin' a mistake puttin' all us in here together, yeah?"

"You bet your scrawny white ass." Intrepid's voice was clipped and full of barely contained violence. The Vuvalini and Dodge had rejoined them quietly, faces awash with the eerie red light of the fire.

Capable saw for the first time the people behind Intrepid. There were so many of them- and they all wore the same expressions of exhausted determination. They didn't care if they lived or died, but they weren't going to be Things any longer. One by one they filed up to Pretty Boy and Dodge, handing them small jugs and canisters that they pulled from their tattered clothing.

"Bang." Dodge giggled, threads of the telltale War Boy manic energy beginning to show in his face. "Gonna go bang. Bangbangbang."

He rocked on his feet, cradling the dirty plastic containers in his arms. Then he, Intrepid and Pretty Boy moved a ways from the fire, beginning to sort out their loot. Their voices were a quiet murmur, arguing over how the should make the escape, and Capable rapidly lost interest.

The Doom Goddess bent over Nux, sniffing at his skin. "You startin' to rot, boyo," she muttered.

Heart in her throat, Capable searched Nux's ruined body. His burns looked much the same, black and charred, the skin a delicate charcoal colored tissue paper that was all that stood between him and the bacteria ridden hellhole they were in. Capable desperately hoped that 'rot' meant that Nux was in dire need of advanced care and not something worse that couldn't be fixed. She didn't know if she could survive having to Witness him again. Loving someone was a beautiful adrenaline rush, but oh, it could also hurt. The thought of losing Nux hurt worse than anything Capable had ever suffered.

The Doom Goddess had shuffled back over to the fire and was again holding her heavy black dreds back as she used a long stick to jab at something in a pot next to the fire. Forking the stick through the pot's two rings, she carried it back over to them. Up close, Capable could smell strong overwhelming stench of garlic combined with other herbs. With a sharp knife, the Doom Goddess cut thick strips of a fleshy spiky green plant that she bound to the lesser of Nux's burns. These were merely an angry red color with some blistering, not the black of death.

"What does that do?" Capable asked, watching the plant, utterly fascinated. The Doom Goddess's healing techniques were very crude and deeply rooted in superstition, but everything she did seemed to have a scientific base underneath all the mumbling and chanting. It was unsettling seeing all the 'magic' in her work, but Capable had to admit that her skills were much more successful than the Organic Mechanic's. The Doom Goddess seemed to have a better success rate and cared more about the patient then getting results that would fulfill the designs of a megalomaniac.

"Killn' pain," The Doom Goddess replied, beginning to wrap Nux's other arm. "He be movin' easier now with the blood of the spike weed."

Capable tentatively squished a bit of the discarded plant between her thumb and forefinger. The edges were sharp but when she smashed it a greasy green goo slid out of the severed end. It smelled clean, like captured sunlight.

"What you got on yo' neckstalk, War Boy?" The Doom Goddess suddenly demanded, pointing at Larry and Barry with one long white tattooed finger.

"They're his lumps," Capable said, running her hand gently over the back of Nux's skull. "Dodge has them too, and Zip. All the War Boys have them. It's what makes them half-life. That and the night fevers." The thought that even if Nux survived this, and that was incredibly unlikely given how horribly he was hurt, she wouldn't have a lifetime with him sobered her.

"They poison or just fatty meat?" the Doom Goddess asked, peering at the lumps. "They gettin' lumps from the world or they momma?"

Capable shook her head, having absolutely no idea what that even meant. Poison? Were the War Boys all dying of the same sick? The world made everyone sick. Everyone was mad and crazy to some extent.

The Doom Goddess let out a frustrated growl. "Heya Pretty Boy! Bring that fine ass over here and come be makin' the straight talk for me."

Pretty Boy straightened with a chuckle and handed a rag to Dodge, who took it and bent over their smoking and sizzling project. After stopping to pass his hands through their fire, Pretty Boy squatted next to the Doom Goddess. He bumped up against her and Capable couldn't help but stare at the closeness, the easy touching. Being close, touching someone for love or comfort, as a rare thing in the Wasteland.

"What's up DG?"

"He got the sick," the Doom Goddess replied, pointing again at Nux's lumps. "I am needing the knowledge of it."

"What does 'getting his sick from the world, or from his mother mean?'" Capable asked. "And are they poisoned? Is something hurting the War Boys?" Other than their penchant to burn out young, that is. The craving of a fire glory filled demise got more War Boys than anything else.

Pretty Boy studied the lumps and thought for a moment. His hand reached out, but he did not touch. "They all have these?" he asked.

Capable nodded.

"I think she wants to know if they're cancerous or benign," Pretty Boy answered, taking the sopping and steaming garlic scented rags from the pot and laying them across Nux wherever the Doom Goddess pointed. "Whether they are due to something in the War Boy's environment or something they inherit genetically from their parents."

"I'm not sure how it happens," Capable said slowly, tying to recall every medical book she'd ever read, which wasn't much. She'd preferred philosophy and critical thinking, subjects so far from the life of a Breeder that it was a refuge. "They live in the caves below the Citadel. The Milking Mothers have them to keep the Milk flowing, and once the Pups are weaned they're taken below. If it's a girl, they become a Mother."

"It would make sense then that the tumors be an inherited predisposition," Pretty Boy replied. He lifted another long strand of cloth from the pot. "Especially if there's so much inbreeding going on. I'm not up on genetics, and it could always be something else, but that's my guess."

The Doom Goddess's hand suddenly shot out, and she pinched Barry hard, rolling the flesh harshly in her fingers and smearing the ink. "Fatty meat," she muttered.

Nux cried out, jerking into consciousness, blue eyes searching wildly for something to strike at. He saw Capable though and slumped, staring at her as though she were the safety line tethering him to sanity and life.

"Easy," Capable said, grasping his searching hand, bending her head so that her lips could press a benediction to his forehead. "It's okay, they're making you better." She hoped that she was not lying to him.

"I won't have the knowing until I cut ya meat open, War Boy," the Doom Goddess said, helping Pretty Boy bind Nux's burns. "But I have the thinking that yo bad meat is not having the fast growing poison."

That meant Nux's tumors, and that of the rest of the War Boys, were not cancerous and could probably be removed.

"You hear that?" Capable whispered excitedly to him, voice trembling with the barely contained emotion. "We might be able to fix the War Boys! No more night fevers, no more half-life."

"Full life," Nux said wonderingly, reaching out to touch a flaming strand of her hair. "Full life with Capable."

"Not havin' the full life til we make it through the waitn' death," the Doom Goddess said practically. She gestured at their cavern prison. "We might still be makin' the eats for the People of the Flesh."

"Dodge is building a bomb that will blow the door and hopefully not bring the cavern down on us. This is only a temporary fix until we can get this kid to DG's healing room." Pretty Boy murmured to Capable, tying off the last of Nux's bandages. The sick War Boy's bandages made him look like a mummy; Capable had read a book on them once. Expect she had stolen him away from the dark of Joe's world, would unearth him into the light of the new begining.

"Drink," the Doom Goddess demanded, handing the bulging water skin to Capable. "We be needn' him to run."

Capable held the water skin, knowing that along with the healing concoction that would give Nux much needed electrolytes, there would also be a lot of opium. "Last time it stopped his heart," she protested.

"We all be stoppin' soon," the Doom Goddess snapped. "If we do not be havin' freedom."

"We need to risk it," Pretty Boy said gently, squashing her protests with his quiet unavoidable logic, "We can't fight and carry him at the same time."

"Strong," Nux interrupted, grasping Capable's hand hard, staring at her with eyes fever bright. "Keep you safe."

"We'll keep each other safe," she corrected. Capable helped him to swallow as much as the water skin as he could, stopping only to let him cough. Then she and Pretty Boy helped him struggle to his feet. Nux was panting, his breath a wheezing rattle, but he was upright.

"Soon the singing of death will come," The Doom Goddess said standing tall, cracking her joints like a white tattooed spider and raising her hands to the sky. "I will burn the dark and ride the fire, free from my sin."

Capable had just enough time to get under Nux's arm, supporting his weight as much as she could, before the door to the cavern exploded in a vicious bang, raining acrid smelling fire and rock down onto the screaming people below.

* * *

 _To be continued..._


	5. Escape is for Fools

**Author's Note:** _Thanks for the reviews, your feedback lets me know what's up. Probably a few more chapters to this; I'm going to start wrapping it up. Losing my thunder for this fic, lol. Thanks for all the thoughts, favs, and follows! You guys are awesome._

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 **Glory to the Desperate**

 **Chapter 5:** _Escape is for Fools_

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Capable felt Nux begin to drop, curling his body around her so that he could take the brunt of the damage from the explosion _. Oh, hell no._ She promptly kicked his ankle out from under him, disorienting him and folding herself so that it was she that formed a living shield. Nux couldn't afford to be taking any more damage; she could. Dimly Capable could hear the Doom Goddess give a chilling war cry: part neurotic scream, part mad laugh. It made the hair stand up on the back of her neck and gooseflesh break out on her spine.

A rush of air made her ears pop painfully and it was quickly followed by a dry scorching heat that toasted her back.

 _I have got to make her teach me that_ , Capable thought, heaving Nux back to his feet. He stumbled drunkenly; weaving like the ground was having a hard time staying put. It was the opium, she realized, and hoped that he wouldn't have another heart attack.

"C'mon," she said, mouth pressed to his ear. "We have to keep up with the others, stay with me."

Nux did his best, though Pretty Boy stayed close by, offering his strength and keeping an eye on the rear of their group. The Doom Goddess, Dodge, and the Vuvalini spread out in a fan pattern, searching for attackers as the group made their way to the exit. They didn't have to work very hard. Their fellow captives had rushed the new opening in a panicked wave the moment they'd seen a chance at freedom. Capable could hear gunshots and screaming. Obviously the guards had come to try to keep them from escaping, but they couldn't stem the tide of hundreds of frightened and pissed off people desperate to get out.

There was a scream, and a hot mist of blood spattered Capable's face. It got in her eyes and burned like hell. She squeezed her eyes shut tight and focused on trying to move forward, trusting Nux to guide her. Capable would not be the reason that they fell behind, that they didn't make it out.

Nux gently tugged her to a halt, slumping against her. "Hold up, shiny girl."

She stopped, floundering blindly. Every time she tried to open her eyes they burned, so she kept them squinched tightly shut. "What's happening?"

Capable heard the sound of Nux spitting, and then a damp rag that smelled strongly of exhaust and diesel gently cleaned the blood from her face.

She opened her eyes, just in time to see Dodge and the Vuvalini braining a mutant with rocks, while the Doom Goddess and Pretty Boy were stripping the weapons off of the dead body of another. Intrepid and Pretty Boy ended up with crude guns; she claimed a bolt action rifle while he snagged a sawed off shotgun. Dodge and the Doom Goddess had grabbed melee weapons, wicked looking bastard children of clubs and swords fashioned from the heavy jaw bones of some massive creatures Capable couldn't identify.

"Move," Intrepid snarled. "Move now!"

The Doom Goddess and Dodge cleared the pathway, braining whoever tried to tangle with them, while Intrepid and Pretty Boy brought up the rear and covered their backs. Capable's heart was in her throat, the echoing thud rattling her ears. The rest of the mad dash was a confusing blend of darkness and heat and screaming.

She hadn't remembered much of the trip into the caves and tunnels; it had been too dark. Now the tunnels were lit up with torches carried by rapidly fleeing prisoners, revealing a twisting maze along with the nightmarish scenario played out by the monsters that slowly picked off outlying victims. They made it through, however. The Doom Goddess and Dodge were a deadly pair, cutting down the mutants in their way with deadly and vicious efficiency. They worked like an efficient machine, churning through the crowds leaving barely recognizable human forms in their wake.

The floor moved, an explosion rocking the caves. Bits of pebbles and dirt rained down onto their head, and in the distance there was faint screaming.

"That wasn't far off." Pretty Boy's voice was calm, an odd juxtaposition to the current crisis at hand.

"We not being cut off from the Holy Place," the Doom Goddess panted, braining a mutant. She paused to heave her club from where it'd been embedded in his face. "Nearly there now."

The Doom Goddess led them into a nearly invisible tunnel off of the main passage. It was hidden by a slimy outcropping of rock, and Capable would have never even noticed it if she hadn't been watching. She hoped that meant that they wouldn't have any visitors while the Doom Goddess tended to Nux.

The Holy Place was a surprisingly clean cave lined with flickering torches, but primarily lit by a six foot high hole that spanned the far wall, opening up to let the glaring light of the desert in. It took Capable a moment to realize what she was seeing.

"How high up are we?" she asked the Doom Goddess, voice small and awe filled. The vegetation and rocks below the mountain looked like pebbles, the vast expanse of the desert spread out before them.

"High enough meat, that that if you be fallin', ya bones will be tenderized and ya corpse laid open for the People of the Flesh to feast upon."

It was not the Doom Goddess who answered.

The Bone Queen stepped from the passageway behind them followed by two mutants. In her hand she held the Doom Goddess's sword, and the tip of the blade rested lightly against Intrepid's neck. Nux's hand tightened on Capable's shoulder and she felt him tensing. Nearby, Pretty Boy and the Doom Goddess moved simultaneously so that they were standing side by side.

"Betrayer," the Bone Queen snarled, eyes watching the Doom Goddess. She was so angry she was practically spitting, "You will all die and we will wear your skins and eat your souls. That meat that you have been trying to make safe will be the first to go."

Capable let her breath out slowly. Over her dead body. This psycho bitch wasn't going to touch Nux, not if she could help it. Intrepid's mouth was a thin line, and Capable had a feeling that the Vuvalini felt the same way. None of them were going to lay down and die. The question was, how was this going to go down? They were at a stalemate with the sword at Intrepid's throat.

The Doom Goddess bared her teeth, looking absolutely feral. "I will have the wining, false queen, and be hangin' yo fleshmeat from the walls of the mountain."

Pretty Boy moved slightly behind the Doom Goddess, so that if she rushed the Bone Queen he would be able to cover her and take on the mutants. The Bone Queen saw this and scoffed.

"You gettin' yo meat to fight yo battles now?"

Pretty Boy shrugged, unconcerned. "I have her back. We're a team."

The Bone Queen looked both incredulous and nauseated. Teamwork and love were both alien concepts to her. Suddenly the Bone Queen's head exploded, spattering Intrepid with gore. The Bone Queen's body crumbled, revealing Max, a giggling Zip who was throttling the last mutant, and an incredibly pissed off Furiosa.

"Some team," Furiosa snapped, absolutely livid. "What the hell, Capable? I leave you with the pups for an hour, and you take two of the few War Boys we have on a joy ride and manage to find flesh eating cave dwelling psychos."

Oops. When put that way her brilliant plan did not sound quite so brilliant. Capable had nothing to say, all of her good intentions had flown straight out the window. She glanced at Max, pleadingly, who shrugged.

"She was already out lookin," Max said. "Just lit a flare to put her on the right trail."

"I be havin' my meat cleaver back," the Doom Goddess interrupted, pulling her sword from the corpse of the deposed queen. "Your quarrel be stoppin' for if you be wantin' ya War Boy to stay live meat, we be healin' him now."

"Do what you gotta," Max told her. "We'll hold the line."

Furiosa nodded briskly. "Two shooters in the channel, Capable and Intrepid. Max and I will stay forward with knives. Keep it quiet. If we're gonna do this, we can't let people know we're in here."

The Doom Goddess sheathed her sword and moved to the fire pit in the center of the room. "Then we begin."

* * *

 _To be continued..._


End file.
